Read my new book, An Enlightened Entrepreneur:
57 Meditations on Kicking @$$ in Business and Life"4.8/5 stars" on Amazon
Tuesday, December 25th, 2012

How I Created My Own Circle Of Competence

4 Comments

The Circle of Competence was one of the most important exercises I did before founding our current company Ongig.

The circle of competencies includes all of the things you are good at.

I started a new business after sitting with my "circle of competence" on my wall for a few months

The Circle of Competence is simple: you write down the things that you are competent about and draw a circle around it. And then, as Buffett explains, remember that the more you go outside your circle of competence,

4 comments so far (is that a lot?) | Continue Reading »


Wednesday, December 19th, 2012

A Non-Techie’s Guide to Starting Her Web Site!

3 Comments

[This is a guest blog post by Angela Privin, a “super-healer,” digestive coach and my friend]

When I was diagnosed with severe digestive issues (Irritable Bowel Syndrome) the doctors told me it was incurable. It was one of the worst days of my life.

Angela, a non-techie, walks through the steps she took to start her Web site (DIYHealthBlog).

Angela's apprentice in building a new Web site is puppy Mishka

But, finding a cure for my “incurable” condition after 6 years of dedicated searching, learning and trial and error was one of the best things I’ve done.

The experience of getting sick and healing myself was not fun, but it awoke

3 comments so far (is that a lot?) | Continue Reading »


Sunday, December 16th, 2012

“Alienate the Non-Prospect” to Truly Dominate Your Market

Comment

Is attracting people to your product always a good idea?

No!

No, attracting potential customers isn’t always a good idea because there is a cost to attracting certain prospects.

The Apple ad with mac guy versus the pc guy | alienating the non-prospect

Apple is ok alienating 80%+ of computer prospects (represented by PC/Windows guy on the left) in order to attract hipper prospects like the Mac Guy (on right).

No comments yet | Continue Reading »


Sunday, December 9th, 2012

My Recent Speech On “Personal Branding” For AMA @ ING Cafe

Comment

I gave a speech on Personal Branding to the American Marketing Association (San Francisco) (thanks, Brian Kerr!) on Nov. 20th at the ING Direct Cafe.

Some of you asked for the slides of the show.

Here’s the Powerpoint slide show via Slideshare and then below that are some notes from the speech:

Rob kelly powerpoint slides personal branding speech ama ing cafe from Rob Kelly

No comments yet | Continue Reading »


Wednesday, September 19th, 2012

The Homework I Gave To My Friend Who Wanted To Generate $60K to $250K in Passive Income

2 Comments

My good friend (let’s call her Rita) recently asked me for tips on how to generate extra passive income of $60,000 to $250,000 per year.

Rita wanted to do this so that her life-partner (who has a stressful job) could live a more comfortable life, and the two of them could pursue some “do-good” creative projects to better the world.

I couldn’t guarantee her anything but she asked for a meeting with me and I came up with some homework that she could do ahead of time (mostly to read some of my past articles and do some exercises).

I know the links/tips I include are all my own…but, hey, that’s what I know best. 😉

I thought I’d share with you my email to Rita in case you or someone you know wants to make some more $dough.

It’s not easy, but if you are serious about wanting to increase your income you’re going to have to put in some work. Here it is.

Dear Rita,

2 comments so far (is that a lot?) | Continue Reading »


Monday, July 23rd, 2012

A Long List Of Words In Our Brains That Brands Own

Comment

The average American knows about 12,000 words (though Shakespeare was said to have had known 66,000) — the best brands are ones that own the most market share of a couple of those words.

CNN owns “news” in my brain. When I think of “reggae,” it’s Bob Marley — he owns it. There’s an awesome analysis of this in Positioning: The Battle For Your Mind (they discuss the concept of ladders (product categories) in your brain with room for just a handful of rungs (brands) — it’s the primary reason I voted it one of the Top 20 Best Business Books Of All Time!).

Who cares? Well, if your business wants market share of something, you have to decide which words you are going to try to “own” in my brain. 

No comments yet | Continue Reading »


Monday, July 16th, 2012

A Uniquely Honest Story Of One Entrepreneur’s “Darkness”

Comment

The cool thing about problems is when people are honest about them, tackle them and then share their “secret sauce” about how they did it. I’m proud to say that my friend Kamal Ravikant just nailed it in his latest book: Love Yourself Like Your Life Depends On It.

No comments yet | Continue Reading »


Sunday, July 8th, 2012

12 Simple Outlines For Writing A Business Plan

1 Comment

If you need to write a business plan I recommend you start with an outline.  I found a dozen free templates and have included them below with links to dig deeper. Good luck!

1) Ongig’s Business Plan Outline

The business plan outline I wrote for Ongig (below) was geared towards raising an angel round of funding.The 3 biggest sections were Business Model, Sales & Distribution and Financials.

  1. Why Should Someone Care (“The Grab” or Executive Summary)
  2. Company Purpose (In one sentence: the vision/mission stuff)
  3. The Problem You Are Addressing
  4. The Solution You Provide
  5. Why Is This Important Right Now?
1 comment so far | Continue Reading »


  1. Pages:
  2. 1
  3. 2
  4. 3
  5. 4
  6. 5
  7. 6
  8. 7
  9. ...
  10. 30